Huawei moves past Oppo to retake the Lead in China’s Smartphone Market

StefanApr 30, 2017

Huawei once again rules the world’s biggest smartphone market. The company’s sales in its home country of China have jumped to 21 million units in the first three months of this year, accounting for 18% of the market. Huawei has thus dethroned Oppo, which was relegated to second place with 20 million sales. This comes despite the fact that Oppo’s grown its sales by 55% year-on-year.

vivo rounds up the Top 3 for Q1 2017, with 15% market share and 17 million units shipped. The first three vendors together account for more than 50% of shipments for the first time ever, which is a sign that the Chinese market is consolidating.

Huawei P10 and P10 PlusA little known fact is that Oppo and vivo are both subsidiaries of the same company, BBK Electronics (along with OnePlus), so if one were to count BBK’s sales in total then it would be No.1 in China by far. But as Oppo, vivo, and OnePlus are actually individual companies and not just divisions of BBK, the analysts are counting their results separately.

Anyway, going back to smartphone sales in China in Q1 of this year – Apple came in fourth, while Xiaomi was fifth, shipping just 9 million devices. Xiaomi fell pretty hard from the third place it occupied in the year-ago quarter. It’s faced increased pressure from Huawei’s Honor sub-brand on pricing, and from Oppo and vivo’s relentless marketing. In total, 114 million smartphones were shipped in China in the first quarter, according to Canalys.

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Stefan (from Austria, Europe) has been living, studying and working in China since 2010. Stefan has worked on several research, publication and consulting projects focusing on the China Travel Market. He holds two Masters degrees and is an expert on China Outbound Tourism, Marketing and Social Media in China. Stefan works with BMG on the Global Ready China Seminars as well as the Global Ready China News and related projects. He also has teaching engagements in the areas of eMarketing and Tourism Strategy.